


not your housekeeper

by RuanChunXian



Series: Three Sentence Fic-a-thon [8]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 3 Sentence Fiction, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-16
Updated: 2013-03-16
Packaged: 2017-12-05 11:15:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/722649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RuanChunXian/pseuds/RuanChunXian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>when she met Sherlock, he was an overgrown boy</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> [Three Sentence Fiction Prompt](http://rthstewart.dreamwidth.org/87903.html)  
>  BBC Sherlock, Mrs. Hudson, not their housekeeper.

When she met Sherlock, he was a mess of an overgrown boy: too brilliant, too aware of his own brilliance for his own good, with no intention of “fitting in” – whatever that meant – and when he couldn’t find sufficient intellectual high from the problems in the world around him, he indulged in unsavoury substances that only ever ended up being a poor substitute for that high.   
  
At first, her attention to him was born out of gratitude but soon, she saw how desperately he needed someone to simply tell him that, as much as he might want to, his body – his transport, as he called it – simply couldn’t keep on going for days without fuel; he was a child, wont to get lost in play, and she couldn’t bring herself to leave him to his own devices, though she tried to erect boundaries for herself.

It wasn’t until that day, the darkest day of her life, which had seen its fair share of darkness, did she realise that somewhere along the way, he had become the child and comfort she never knew she needed; it didn’t matter anymore, though, because he was gone, and who needed her now?


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Moar? I can't stop.

John needed her, she realised, though not in the same way Sherlock did, and now differently than the way he did when Sherlock was still ---

John was perfectly capable of taking care of himself; he ate when he was hungry (he ate more now that Sherlock wasn’t there to root him up in the middle of a bite to chase murderers down alleyways anymore), he slept when night came, he worked, he even did her shopping now for her when her hips acted up; that is all to say, he stayed, and she let him stay, and lowered the rent even more, because she couldn’t bear to see him move away (and John didn’t need to know Mycroft was making up the difference).

Maybe it should be said that now they needed each other, that they both implicitly knew they would never get over this, and that perhaps instead of trying to move on and fail, it was easier to pretend day after day that it was a possibility that Sherlock was only out on one of his mad chases again, that in the kitchen there was still hair on the stove and fingers in the butter, and that one day, they’ll wake up to a gunshot at the wall or to the sound of Bach again.


End file.
